


Awake in time

by oceankat8



Category: Doctor Who, Supernatural
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-04
Updated: 2014-11-04
Packaged: 2018-02-24 01:13:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2562737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oceankat8/pseuds/oceankat8
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time Baby saw her, the boys were still young, innocent and wide-eyed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Awake in time

The first time Baby saw her, the boys were still young, innocent and wide-eyed. When Baby wished quite often that she could just steal them away, take them somewhere safe. Away from the cold of her driver, the fears whispered in their ears, and the lessons he beat into them, but she couldn’t and she’d regret leaving them behind in those cheap motels to fend for themselves but she was glad to take John away. And maybe she didn’t drive as fast or turn as smooth, and waited until he talked to her and soothed her before she even started again. But there was only so much she could do.

  
It was during one of his longer trips away from her boys when it happened. She had been parked just outside the room her driver stayed in, she’s forgotten what he’d been hunting, but it doesn’t matter. Her boys were safe somewhere else and she was alone, outside a motel listening. She didn’t usually listen, it was too specific a way to observe, and there was nothing to be done should she hear anything anyways. But she wasn’t thinking about that just then, in fact, she hadn’t quite been thinking at all.

  
If she had been running, she’d have stalled, as it was she simply continued to listen, except now, she had the overwhelming urge _to just drive towards that sound_. But she didn’t. She couldn’t. She was a car.

  
It was such a different sound, a unique sound she had never heard before, a sound that was so incredibly familiar. Distinct. The type of sound that Baby would remember until she was a rusted skeleton in Bobby’s yard. The type of sound that would stick with her through all her wrecks, crashes, and all those times she thought she was finished and Dean just put her back together again.

  
It sounded roughly like time and space was screeching to a halt, breaks squealing filling the small parking lot with energy. And maybe an outsider could hear the tell-tale click of an engine trying to start, the energy pulling at her engine, pulling her towards the sound, only to be stopped by her own brakes. And it was there.

  
The most beautiful thing Baby had ever seen, could even imagine, was right there, in front of her, not ten feet away. Baby completely stilled, not that an outsider would have been able to tell, because she was already parked, but it was at the other’s presence that she stilled inside. The tiny beginning of a soul that she was, stilled entirely. She felt completely inadequate, antiquated even, next to such a powerful, beautiful _thing_. Even as well-kept and cared for as she was, Baby almost attempted to shy away, feeling the stirrings of a new emotion, humility. But she _was_ noticed, and Baby felt warm amusement and soft affection soothe over her, and she almost felt alive.

  
Then a man stepped out. Or rather, was launched out, enthusiastically. Waving around a strange light and looking a complete fool, the man acted as if the shadows themselves would attack him. A look she remembers on her boys, every time she drove away. Terrified, yet determined. As the man danced in his odd little circles turning this way and that, holding the little light threateningly, his expression quickly dropped to a confused frown. He turned a final one-eighty and stopped, facing away from the box. The blue box.

  
Baby had never seen a box quite like it. It read ‘Police Box’ and Baby toyed with the idea that it was the machine’s name, but another ripple of amusement washed over her, and Baby got the distinct feeling that she was being laughed at. And she felt another new emotion, embarrassment. And it felt red hot, as if her engine had over run.

  
The strange man was still dancing around, except this time he was more like a bee buzzing around, trying to find a flower in a grassy field. He would go up to something, wave his light, look at it, mumble something, rinse and repeat. It was almost cute in a child-like wonder way, and Baby sensed the majority of the Police box’s affection was aimed at this goofy little human, and all at once she was reminded of her little boys and she felt the warmth of her own affection.  
It was as this feeling grew inside her that the man stopped, and straightened. He slowly turned on the heels of his bright red shoes until he was staring right at her.

  
“ _Hell_ -o, what are you,” the man started towards her, and had Baby been human she might have stood straighter or averted her eyes, or maybe ran away hiding her face in her hands and curling into a ball of shame. But she wasn’t. And as it was, she felt only open curiosity and maybe a touch of confusion, directed right at her.

  
As he came closer, she noticed more about him, he had glasses, for one, and freckles, and the little light looked like a toy, but he treated it like an EMF. He started to circle her, waving the little light around her, the way he danced around the rest of the parking lot. Except now that he was focusing his attention on her, she felt what it was he was doing. She felt something peel apart what little consciousness she had and for the first time she felt fear for herself, rather than for another, and she panicked. She attempted to hide herself from the probing light, try to keep herself together until he was finished.

  
“Hmmmm… 1967 Chevrolet Impala, black, well loved, but there’s something more…” She felt him probing deeper, reaching for the little spark that made her almost alive. She couldn’t stop him, because she didn’t have that kind of strength, not yet, but she did feel fear. And its bitter taste tainted her frame.

  
“Oh? Oh…. _Oh dear_. I’m terribly sorry about that” The man backed away, and the feeling of being opened like a book to be read went with him. The light tucked back into his suit.

  
_“I hadn't realized, sorry, I won’t be doing that again. Can you give me a name?_ ” This time she heard him clearer, not in the general way she heard most things, with the tiny bit of consciousness she had, but as if he was sending the words straight to her, with his own mind.

  
And with that, something seemed to slot into place, and for the first time, Baby was able to think. Not just feel the little inklings of emotion and perception that had been the entirety of her existence before, but to think thoughts, as simple as they might be, and to understand what was said. The first thing she would ever think was in answer to his question.

  
“ _Baby_ ,” and the first thing she had truly realized was the smug satisfaction that rolled off the machine next to her. The being whose understanding went so much farther than Baby’s, whose thoughts were so much better formed, whose feelings came so much stronger, and whom could act on whatever whims she so chose with a power that Baby couldn’t comprehend. The power that allowed her to be here, to drive herself, and so much more.

  
As the realization rolled over her, she felt another soft wave of affection, this time though, she understood it, and Baby felt another new emotion threaten to envelope her, Awe.

  
She would look back on this moment later, as the first moment she began to actually live, the moment she had developed the inklings of thought and formed the beginnings of a heart inside the tiny soul she had created of herself. And afterwards she felt many emotions, some new ones, some stronger than others, but all with a different feeling, and at a different thought. Like when she felt the bitter chain of guilt wrap around her for hurting her boys, or the strong spark of energy that was joy when Dean and Sam took her for a spin alone for the first time, or the overwhelming hollow feeling of loneliness whenever she left them behind.

  
Baby often wondered with her new ability to think, whether any of these thoughts or emotions would have happened had that beautiful blue box, and that strange man never come to see her, but they never stayed there long, always focusing on the task at hand, and the boys at her wheel, or in her passenger seat.

  
If Baby was strong enough then she might have heard what the blue box was saying, known the implications of what she was feeling, and maybe even figured out what she was. But she wasn’t, and she didn’t. All too soon the strange man and the beautiful blue box had disappeared, before Baby could find out her name, before she could have guessed what she was, before she could realize why such a wonderful, awesome _thing_ could have sought out such a dull, weak, _car_. One that couldn’t at the time, even bring herself to feel more than one emotion, or string together a thought. Before she could realize even, that things and people weren’t supposed to just disappear.

  
So Baby was left alone, and cold in the absence of the warmth the blue box had brought. And she felt hollow and empty, lonely in its absence. And she stayed that way, her newly crafted consciousness only able to focus on repeating the few moments that it had been in her existence. She didn’t even realize she had been driven, until she was parked outside another crappy motel, and she heard the soft voices of children. And felt the warmth of their souls, and she saw the wide smiles on their faces, and that was enough. Because she knew now how it felt to love, and her soul wept.

As time went on, her emotions grew stronger, and her thoughts developed in complication. She was almost alive, and she grew more so each day. Because maybe she wanted to see that box again, and maybe she wanted that box to be proud of her, of what she had been able to become. Or maybe, she just wanted to care for her boys the way they cared for her.

  
The boys grew up, Sam left, John disappeared, Sam came back. Baby almost killed her boys, and John never came back. Dean pieced her back together, and then he disappeared himself. Sammy fell apart, but there was nothing she could do, and she felt useless. But he came back, just different, hollow. With a hole in his heart and an angel on his shoulder. She gained a new passenger, another lost boy to care for, and she loves him just as fiercely as her boys. She would always have room. The apocalypse came and went, many passengers died, her boys though, always came back, until they didn’t, and it was just her and Dean. And he locked her away, in another garage, useless. And then there was a time, when she had two passengers, but only one soul. And it hurt when Dean called him Sammy. And she could not do anything, but stay there, and just wish for them to be safe, to be happy, and hope one day, it would come true. So she cared for them, and life continued, as it was. The blue box pushed from her mind, but not forgotten, never quite forgotten.

  
Until she heard it again. The sound of the universe coming to a screeching halt and she stopped. Using all the strength she had to pull on her brakes and to still her wheels in the desperate, frantic hope built on nothing but an almost forgotten memory. And it was there, hurtling towards them. The boys were shouting profanities and curses and all sorts of things Baby didn’t hear. Because at that moment there was a voice, a soft, powerful voice, whose tone was colored with pleasant surprise and tilted in amusement,

  
_“Hello Baby, it’s good to see you awake”_


End file.
